Legal Lynching Of Saddam Hussein

By James Cogan

20 October 2005
World Socialist Web

The trial of Saddam Hussein that began yesterday in Baghdad, under the
auspices of the US-created Supreme Iraqi Criminal Tribunal (SICT) and
the US-sponsored Iraqi government, is a legal travesty. No credibility
can be given to the prosecution of the former Iraqi head of state by a
puppet court and client administration that exist only due to the
illegal and predatory invasion of Iraq by US imperialism and the
continued presence of more than 150,000 American and other foreign
troops.

Hussein and his Baathist regime have many crimes against the Iraqi
people to answer for. However, the proceedings starting today are
nothing but a show trial designed to have the former dictator quickly
sentenced to death and executed. The aim is not justice, but to obscure
the complicity of the United States, Britain and other major powers in
many of Hussein's atrocities.

Today Hussein is being prosecuted only for 19 charges relating to the
massacre of some 150 people in the village of Dujail in 1982. The
murders followed a failed assassination attempt on the Baathist leader
by alleged members of the Shiite fundamentalist Da'awa organisation-the
party of the current Iraqi prime minister, Ibrahim al-Jaafari.

The Dujail massacre has been carefully chosen, instead of other Baathist
crimes that were encouraged or sanctioned by the major powers. These
include the slaughter of Iraqi Communist Party members in 1979; the
murder of thousands of Shiites in the lead-up to the 1980 US-backed
Iraqi invasion of Iran; the use of Western-supplied chemical weapons
against Iranian troops and civilians during the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war;
the pogroms against the Kurdish population in the late 1980s; and the
butchery of tens of thousands of Shiites and Kurds following the 1991
Gulf War.

It is no secret that the prosecution of Hussein has been crafted to
prevent any repetition of the ongoing trial of former Yugoslav leader
Slobodan Milosevic in the UN-run International Criminal Tribunal, where
he is facing 66 charges of war crimes and genocide allegedly committed
in Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo.

Milosevic is a nationalist demagogue who bears much responsibility for
the horrors inflicted on the Balkan peoples in the 1990s. Over the past
four years, however, he has used his trial to document the machinations
of the major powers in fomenting the ethnic conflicts that tore apart
the region and to expose the criminality of the NATO attack on
Yugoslavia in 1999. The trial has become, to put it mildly, an
embarrassment for the prosecutors.

Hussein's defence is certain to challenge the legality of the 2003
US-led invasion and thus the legitimacy of the court. However, by
narrowly framing the charges, the US is hoping to avoid any questions
about its collaboration with the Baathist regime in the 1980s. Hussein
could, for example, relate the discussions he held with US presidential
envoy, and now Secretary of Defence, Donald Rumsfeld in 1983 and 1984,
which led to US assistance to Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war.

The consequence is a trial that has more in common with a lynching,
guided by the principle that dead men don't talk. It has been thoroughly
prejudiced by the Iraqi government, which has all but directed the SICT
to hand down the death sentence against Hussein in the shortest possible
time.

Iraq's president Jalal Talabani told national television on September 6
that Hussein was a "war criminal and he deserves to be executed 20 times
a day for his crimes". Prime minister Jaafari declared on Monday that
the trial was not a "research project". All the judges had to decide, he
emphasised, was, "has this man committed crimes?" and to do so quickly.

Article 30(b) of the SICT statute dictates that a death sentence must be
carried out within 30 days of appeals being exhausted.

On October 16, Human Rights Watch drew attention to this article in a
lengthy critique of the Hussein trial. The sentencing stipulation, it
noted, "creates the possibility that a person charged in several cases
can be tried, convicted and executed for one of those cases, before any
other cases are subject to public trial, and as such is likely to
deprive victims, witnesses and the Iraqi people as a whole of the
opportunity to conclusively establish which individuals were legally
responsible for some of the worst human rights violations in Iraq's
history. The execution of convicted individuals while other charges are
pending against them means that there may never be a public accounting
of the evidence for and against them in relation to these events."

The Washington Post commented on October 18: "The length and complexity
of the Milosevic trial helped convince Iraqi prosecutors that they
needed to concentrate on a few key events rather than attempt to cover
the full range of alleged atrocities during Hussein's 24-year rule,
legal experts and observers said."

The paper ignored the fact that the US occupation authority created the
precursor to SICT, wrote its initial statutes and selected the chief
investigative judge and four other judges to preside over the trial. The
Bush administration decided to exclude the UN from any role in the
Hussein trial in order to guarantee the tightest possible control over
the proceedings.

The case against Hussein and other Baathists has been prepared from the
beginning by a liaison office made up of lawyers and advisors from the
US, Britain and Australia-all countries whose governments are themselves
guilty of war crimes for the 2003 invasion and subsequent occupation.
The New York Times noted on Tuesday that "the liaison office has been
the real power behind the tribunal, advising, and often deciding, on
almost every facet of its work, always behind a shield of anonymity".
The SICT's activities are funded by $138 million from Washington.

The stench of illegitimacy that surrounds the Hussein trial has produced
a remarkable state of affairs. In stark contrast to the gloating
coverage of Hussein's capture 22 months ago, the Bush administration and
the US media provided virtually no commentary as the date of his trial
approached. Had the White House wanted to, it would have gone out of its
way to make the event a focus of attention.

The muted reportage reflects the fear in Washington that Hussein's
prosecution may prove to be another factor in intensifying
anti-occupation opposition and the armed insurgency against US and
government military forces.

The American manipulation of the trial can only undermine the Shiite and
Kurdish parties that make up the Iraqi government. Many of their
supporters already regard the promises of Iraqi sovereignty and
independence from Washington as a sham. Among millions of Shia and
Kurdish workers and rural poor-who suffered at the hands of the
Baathists and continue to suffer appalling conditions-the limited
character of the charges against Hussein can only add to their anger and
frustration.

The trial will also compound the anger among Sunnis. In the
two-and-a-half years since the invasion of Iraq, and contrary to its
expectations, US imperialism has been unable to enlist the collaboration
of any significant section of the Sunni Arab establishment that
underpinned Hussein's regime, let alone support from the broader Sunni
population.

The voting in last weekend's referendum on a draft constitution revealed
the extent of the divisions. While Sunnis overwhelmingly voted no, Kurds
and Shiites predominantly voted yes. Amid rising sectarian tensions,
many Sunnis consider that they have been marginalised and have nothing
to lose by backing the insurgency.

Hussein's lawyer Khalil al-Dulaimi has made clear in press statements
that the central thrust of the legal defence will be a rejection of the
court's legitimacy. He plans to demand that the entire trial be
adjourned while a motion to dismiss the case is prepared.

Amid concerns over the impact of the trial, US officials have been
applying pressure on the Iraqi government not to televise today's
proceedings. If it is broadcast, there is likely to be a 20-minute delay
between filming and transmission. As the New York Times blandly stated,
this "appeared intended to allow the tribunal to censor any untoward
developments in the court-an outburst from Mr Hussein perhaps, or a
security breakdown".

The Hussein trial is shaping up to be another political debacle for the
Bush administration and the US occupation of Iraq.